Chapter 146 – Avalanche

Su Jin was really shocked. He never expected Situ Jin to actually be an owner as well. He stared at Situ Jin and felt like finding a chance to take a peek into his mind again.

“Is this what Xu Ran was worried about?” wondered Su Jin. If Xu Ran had been worried that Situ Jin would do something like this, then his worries weren’t unfounded. Handbook owners could become extremely powerful anytime. Situ Jin was no match for him today, but he could suddenly become more powerful than him after the next Challenge.

Situ Jin was drenched in cold sweat and he felt so defeated. The young man before him had actually beat him so soundly with his aura alone.

The white glow slowly faded and disappeared completely, since it was an item that could only be used once. Situ Jin had specially exchanged his points for this item in order to hunt down rogue owners.

“No, wait! That wasn’t your aura. What did you do?” Situ Jin’s eyes suddenly widened. The concept of aura sounded too ridiculous to be true, so it had to be something else.

“Spirit Power. I believe you’ve heard of it before. Only owners with Spirit Power can be called veterans,” explained Su Jin without withholding any information. After all, even if he didn’t explain it now, he was sure that Situ Jin would eventually deduce what happened in no time.

Situ Jin looked like he had just been enlightened and Su Jin flung the short club back at the older man. He glowered at Situ Jin and said, “You work for the government, so how could you target my family over a personal feud? If you don’t have a good explanation for doing this, I’ll kill you!”

Situ Jin believed that. He could sense the rage within Su Jin, so he knew Su Jin was serious about this.

“I was not trying to attack your family members. In fact, you could say that I saved them. If I hadn’t paid your hometown a visit, your parents would probably be dead by now.” Situ Jin decided to be honest with Su Jin, since Su Jin was very agitated now and might really smite him on the spot.

Su Jin frowned and said, “And how am I supposed to believe that?”

“You could change my memories the last time, right? That means you can check them too, isn’t it?” said Situ Jin.

Su Jin immediately sent his psychokinesis into Situ Jin’s brain and found the most recent set of memories. Just like what Situ Jin said, he had actually saved Su Jin’s parents from harm.

The misunderstanding made Su Jin feel rather embarrassed now, because that meant that Situ Jin wasn’t an enemy, and was actually a benefactor now.

“I, uh…thank you for doing that,” said Su Jin awkwardly.

“There’s no need to thank me. It’s my job to protect my fellow citizens. Other than yourself, your family consists of ordinary folks, so they fall under my protection as well,” said Situ Jin stiffly. To him, this was his job, so he didn’t think it was necessary for anyone to thank him for doing his job properly.

As for the two foreigners whom Su Jin had seen in Situ Jin’s memories, the first people he thought of was that group that robbed other owners. He couldn’t think of any other reason why owners from a different country would be hunting him down like this.

“Then why were you with my younger sister?” asked Su Jin. The one who had discovered Situ Jin was Su Qing, not his parents.

Situ Jin had an equally confused look on his face as he smacked his head and said, “I really don’t know why either. Your younger sister used this on me and erased the memories I had just prior to that.”

“What’s this? A memory erasing device?” Su Jin looked at the item that Situ Jin held up and instantly thought of the device used in the movie, Men in Black. This thing did look a lot like the neuralyzer in the movie.

Situ Jin nodded and sighed heavily. “I don’t remember how it happened at all. This item belongs to me, yet I ended up falling victim to it. I really don’t remember what I did when I met your sister.”

Su Jin nearly called Situ Jin a douchebag when he heard those words, since this description made Situ Jin sound like one of those jerks who had their way with a girl and then dumped her mercilessly.

“You saved my parents, so let me help you with that.” There was no such thing as erasing memories. It was more accurate to say that the memories had been sealed off elsewhere. Situ Jin still had memory of what happened, except that it was in the deep recesses of his subconsciousness. Su Jin’s psychokinesis could not only change another person’s memories, but it could also retrieve these sealed off memories.

Situ Jin didn’t like Su Jin very much, but he trusted him. Or perhaps even though he treated Su Jin as an enemy, the fact that Su Jin did not kill him despite having the upper hand and the fact that Su Jin gave him the chance to explain himself and acknowledged that there was a misunderstanding earlier told him that Su Jin was not a despicable and wicked person.

With Situ Jin’s permission, Su Jin sent his psychokinesis into Situ Jin’s brain again. He quickly located the sealed memories and unsealed them so that Situ Jin could retrieve them too.

“It looks like I really owe you big time,” said Su Jin as he laughed self-deprecatingly and shook his head. Situ Jin had not just saved his parents, but also saved his younger sister. He definitely owed Situ Jin a big one now.

Situ Jin didn’t care for any of that. His voice was still unfriendly as he said, “Like I said, protecting my fellow citizens from harm is my job.”

Despite having said that, Su Jin still felt that he owed Situ Jin a favor anyway. But that was not important now. The problem now was that this organization of robbers had moved on to attacking his family members, which meant that these people had no ethical boundaries at all. Su Jin wasn’t afraid of them attacking him, but his friends and family couldn’t possibly be so lucky as to have Situ Jin pop up to save them all the time.

“I’ve got to think of a way to resolve this problem,” thought Su Jin with a frown. But he wasn’t really confident of solving this issue, since the organization was huge and had a lot of owners at their disposal.

Su Jin turned his attention back to Situ Jin and said, “Let’s talk about us first. What do you want from me?”

“I’m here to evaluate you and perhaps…I might hunt you down!” replied Situ Jin very simply.

Su Jin was stunned by this response. The more he talked to Situ Jin, the more he couldn’t understand this man. He really regretted not searching the rest of his brain earlier.

“Owners of Hell’s Handbook are a dangerous variable, and they are a potential threat to not only this country, but the entire world and perhaps even all of mankind. I’ve killed several owners recently because they are of poor character and have poor morals. After gaining the supernatural powers that come with the Handbook, they began to indulge in wicked deeds. You’re an owner too, so I need to judge how dangerous you are,” explained Situ Jin.

Su Jin didn’t know how to respond. Was he supposed to admire this man for having a lot of guts? Situ Jin wasn’t an owner yet when Su Jin last met him, which meant that Situ Jin had become an owner only very recently. Just trying to imagine a newbie owner hunting down other owners completely blew Su Jin’s mind. It was a miracle that Situ Jin was still alive and well right now.

“Allow me to give you a kind warning – out of all the owners I’ve met, your capabilities are right at the bottom of the barrel. If you go around killing other owners at this level, you’re more likely to end up dead,” said Su Jin. He understood where Situ Jin was coming from. Owners had supernatural powers and access to weapons that nobody else in the world did, so if they wanted to, they could indeed be very dangerous characters. The organization of robbers was a group that targeted owners, but in the process of robbing owners, they also caused harm to ordinary folk who happened to be in the line of fire.

Situ Jin knew that Su Jin was right, but time and tide waited for no man. He could take his time to slowly increase his capabilities, but the people of his country could not wait so long for him. There were people who needed help every single day.

“I don’t have a choice. If I had taken the time to slowly train myself up before doing such things, your parents would be dead by now,” said Situ Jin expressionlessly.

Su Jin had no answer to that. Situ Jin was right. While Situ Jin seemed like a strangely irrational and troublesome person to him, there was no doubt that Situ Jin was a hero to ordinary folks.

He didn’t know what else to say, but he began to see why Xu Ran wanted to protect this friend of his so much.

Just then, they both felt the ground shake.

“What’s going on?” Situ Jin looked around but could not find the source of the shaking.

“Mai, is something happening nearby?” Su Jin immediately contacted Kano Mai.

“Jin, bad news! An avalanche is happening! A large amount of snow is coming down from the top of the mountain and there are a lot of people in the way of the snow, so they’re in great danger!” replied Kano Mai.

“Damn it!” cursed Su Jin. He turned to Situ Jin and said, “An avalanche is happening nearby, so you’d better keep your distance because it’s very dangerous. Contact the authorities and tell them to send help right now!” He then turned to walk off.

“Where are you going?” Situ Jin yelled after him.

“You might be a hero, but I’m not someone who just leaves others in the lurch either! I’ll save whoever I can!” Su Jin ran off as quickly as lightning. He knew that avalanches happened very fast and he didn’t have a lot of time to waste.

After Su Jin disappeared out of sight, Situ Jin pulled his phone out and called his superintendent. “Sir, an avalanche is happening on Cloud Mountain in Z Province, so please contact the relevant authorities now. We need them to send help immediately.”

“Cloud Mountain? You’re at Cloud Mountain now?” his superintendent asked.

“That’s not important now! I’ll explain things later. We need help now!” barked Situ Jin before hanging up and running off in the same direction as Su Jin.

Su Jin had reached the mountain very quickly, but his eyes widened when he saw the sheer amount of snow coming down. He didn’t think he would be able to save a lot of people by himself.

“Mai, tell me which part of the mountain has the most number of tourists! We can only try our best!” said Su Jin.

“Got it. The highest concentration of tourists is at 7 o’clock, about 1,800 meters away from you. There are 17 of them and I think they’re a tour group,” Kano Mai reported back.

Su Jin immediately ran in that direction and covered all 1,800 meters in barely a second. The tourists were all too terrified and panicky to even move out of the way.

He quickly stood between them and the snow and retrieved his Demon Lord’s Longbow. He shot the Roar of the Demon Lord at the snow and it managed to blast a good amount away. But it didn’t take long for more snow to come rolling down.

“Damn it!” Su Jin cursed inwardly as he clenched his teeth, then glared hard at the oncoming snow. A silver beam of light shot out from his eyes and an invisible force suddenly stopped the snow from falling.